


Subject 01-Omega: An Incomplete Case Study

by pr0nz69



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Abuse, Dehumanization, Gen, Human Experimentation, Humiliation, Hurt/Comfort, Medical Experimentation, Medical Torture, Psychological Torture, Starvation, Torture, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-01 07:19:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18795592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pr0nz69/pseuds/pr0nz69
Summary: The door slides open, stirring him from his thoughts, and two sober-looking men in Garrison orange and black enter. Keith raises an eyebrow.“Come with us,” one says, and Keith uncrosses his arms. This isn't right. Something about this isn't right. He glances over his shoulder, almost expecting to find Shiro right behind him, ready to support him in this, but of course, no one's there.He's on his own.——Keith just wants to join the Garrison to make Shiro proud. The Garrison found his knife and has other plans for him.





	Subject 01-Omega: An Incomplete Case Study

**Author's Note:**

> This is my submission for the Voltron whump zine _If You Need Me_. Thank you to everyone who supported it—we raised a lot of money for a great cause!
> 
> I didn’t get to go nearly as in-depth as I wanted to with this piece because, as always, I got overly ambitious and underestimated the shortness of the already generous word limit. But I’m especially happy with the expanded comfort portions I was able to add. I had a great time working on this piece and with so many other fantastic writers and artists! Check out the collection for more whumpy goodness! <3

1.1 Subject 01-Omega

The first thing that's amiss is that his files should be impeccable, so Keith can't fathom why  _he's_  the only cadet hopeful being called back to the Galaxy Garrison's medical unit for additional testing. It was Shiro, after all, who helped him compile a detailed account of his medical history, and Shiro wouldn't have gotten that wrong.

He can't even think of what more they could want from him. He already submitted to a blood test and a urine test and too many drug tests to bother keeping track of. He endured all of their tedious questioning about his past, his home life, his mental state. He exceeded expectations on the physical fitness evaluation. Yet here he is, arms crossed, leaning against the wall in a featureless exam room, waiting for... He has no idea _what_ for, just that a thin, harried-looking man named Haig took his vitals before telling him to wait here for the doctor.

It's while he's pacing the room waiting for said doctor that he discovers the _second_ thing that's amiss: The door is locked from the outside.

Maybe it was an accident. Maybe it doesn't mean anything. But it's unsettling all the same, and he's quickly gone from annoyed and disgruntled to annoyed, disgruntled, and anxious.

He huffs, blowing a strand of hair from his eyes, trying to affect disinterest to no one in particular, but it makes him feel a little more relaxed. He thinks about Shiro, how he's only doing this for him because Shiro believes in him, and that—well, that's something he hasn't had in a while, someone's faith in him. No matter how many times that simple fact crosses his mind, it still seems unreal. After Dad died, he forgot how it felt to be needed—and how it felt to need someone in return.

 _A weakness, maybe,_ he thinks, but without any of the gravity or vitriol he might have expressed only months earlier.

The door slides open, stirring him from his thoughts, and two sober-looking men in Garrison orange and black enter. Keith raises an eyebrow.

“Come with us,” one says, and Keith uncrosses his arms. This isn't right. Something about this isn't right. He glances over his shoulder, almost expecting to find Shiro right behind him, ready to support him in this, but of course, no one's there.

He's on his own.

He considers leaving the facility, just pushing past these men and walking right out, the Garrison be damned. Shiro will understand. Shiro knows he's never been one for rules and subordination. But before he can make up his mind, the men circle behind him, putting their hands on his shoulders with more force than is natural. They urge him forward through the door, down the hallway that's all chrome and sharp geometry to another room, this one marked by a keypad and a plaque denoting it as Exam Room S1.

This room is small and white-walled, much the same as the other but with one alarming change: An examination table with leather straps all along its sides.

“Wh-what is this?” Keith asks, jerking away from his escorts. They make no move to hold him again, to his relief, but remain on either side of the door, unnervingly like a pair of guards.

The one who spoke before tosses something to him, and he realizes with dismay that it's a flimsy cotton hospital gown. “Change into this. You can keep your underwear on. The doctor will be with you shortly.”

With that, the men leave, and not a moment after, Keith thrusts the gown to the floor and sits, arms tightly folded, in the single chair in the room that he suspects is for the doctor, not him. His eyes drift to where _he_ should be sitting—the table with the straps. Why did they move him to _this_ room if not for _that_?

He gets up after a while and paces, wondering if this door is locked, too but unwilling to check. His thoughts run wild, accelerating from the Garrison accusing him of faking his results (maybe one of his classmates sabotaged them) to the government finding a discreet way to dispose of him for overhearing something he shouldn't have (he can't think of anything like that).

He stills when he hears the beeping of the keypad. The door rolls open, admitting a man with a white coat and a less-than-pleasant affect.

“Why haven't you changed?” the doctor asks, annoyed.

“Tell me what this is about,” Keith says, ignoring the question.

“Do you want to be approved for consideration into the Garrison or not?”

Keith hesitates, still not ready to throw this all away over what's probably ( _hopefully_ ) just his overactive imagination. Biting his cheek, he crouches, picks the gown off the floor. “Turn around.”

But the doctor doesn't. “I don't need to entertain your modesty. You've wasted enough time as it is. Let's just get this over with.”

Keith couldn't agree more with his last sentiment, but that doesn't make stripping before this man any easier. Casting down his eyes, he turns his own back to the doctor and wrestles his t-shirt up over his head, tossing it onto the chair. He can feel the man's gaze on him, burning into his back as he kicks off his shoes and socks. He pauses with his hands at his belt line.

 _Sick bastard_ , he thinks, channeling his anger into action as he thrusts his pants down to his ankles before he can lose his nerve. The doctor is silent as he whips the gown around himself like a cape, covering his body as best he can.

The doctor makes no mention of his display of defiance, just points tiredly at the exam table. “Hop up there.”

Keith sits gingerly on the edge, eyeing the straps. But the doctor doesn't use them on him, just snaps on some gloves and has him lie back as his hands roam his body, poking and prodding and appearing to find nothing of interest.

_What's he looking for?_

Keith squirms as the doctor pushes up his gown and slips two fingers beneath the waistband of his boxers, seeking out his pulse and then feeling brusquely around his pelvic area.

“Absolutely nothing there,” the doctor mutters after a few moments that drag forever, and for some reason, Keith feels his cheeks heat.

 _No one asked you,_  he wants to say, but there's a lump in his throat, and no words find their way over it.

“Sit up,” the doctor says, covering him again. He checks his eyes, ears, and throat with a penlight, again noting nothing out of place.

“I suspect your test results will be ready soon,” he says, stripping off his gloves. “Someone will come get you to discuss them.”

Keith slides off the table, reaches for his shirt.

“No,” the doctor says, “not yet. Depending on your results, you may need to be examined further.”

Now that he isn't lying prone and vulnerable, Keith feels a bit of courage return to him. “Just what's going on here, anyway? None of the other applicants had to go through this! Why me?”

The doctor waves him off as he steps outside. “I'm not at liberty to discuss it with you.”

The door clangs shut behind him, echoing into silence. This time, heart pounding, Keith reaches out his hand to try it.

Locked.

He swallows. What's going on? Why is he locked up in here? Damn it, why did he bother coming back?

He tries to calm down. Legally, they can't detain him without just cause, right? He should be out of here in no time, and then—and then he'll go to Shiro, and Shiro will go to the police or a lawyer or the media, and the Garrison will be exposed, and then— _something_. Something will happen. But they won't get away with this. No way they'll get away with this.

He won't give them the chance. He'll run.

He rips the hospital gown off and scrambles back into his own clothes. The door's locked now, but it won't be forever. When they come for him, he'll force his way out. He parked his hovercraft outside. As long as he can make it there...

Voices outside his room draw his attention.

“I checked him all over.” It’s the doctor. “Externally, he's no different from any other human male.”

Human? The word catches Keith off-guard. Are they really suggesting— _no_. No way.

“We've tested him extensively,” a woman says, “and the results couldn't be clearer; his genetic makeup is comprised of a non-insignificant amount of unidentifiable DNA.”

Keith reels back from the door. This is a joke. It has to be a joke.

“Then I'll leave him to you,” says the doctor, and Keith can barely hear him over the thudding of his heart. “What's the next step?”

He leans forward, holding his breath.

“Detainment and observation.”

He doesn't hear what the doctor says in response, if he says anything. He retreats into the room, casting around for something, _anything_ , to defend himself with. His eyes land on the chair. It's heavy and unwieldy, and he doubts he'll be able to make a successful weapon of it. Still, it's the only thing in the room that isn't bolted down, so he drags it to the door, hoping to at least distract the woman and the doctor when they come for him.

But when the door slides open, it isn't either who greets him but the two large Garrison men from before. His hand falters on the chair, but it hardly matters; the men are on him almost at once.

“Get off me!” he shouts, thrashing as hands close around his wrists.

“Oh, my,” a voice says, and Keith jerks his head around to see a woman in a white coat smiling at him, her fingers spidering over her chin as if in concern though her voice contains none of it. “What prompted  _this_  violent display, hm?”

She looks to be about middle-aged, though her long auburn hair held high up in a ponytail at the back of her head gives her an uncanny youthful aspect that’s further accentuated by the springy way she walks. Keith leans back as she steps closer, peering into his face. The Garrison men hold him fast, twisting his arms behind his back until he's wincing.

“Truly fascinating,” the woman hums. “Dr. Haversham was right—you look completely human!”

“What are you talking about?” Keith hears his voice waver and tries to steady it. “Of course I'm human! Now let me go!”

The woman clicks her tongue. “I’m sorry, dear. We're going to need to hold you in isolation for the time being.”

Keith starts, and she adds, predicting his response, “I would advise you not to resist; you'll only end up hurting yourself, and that’s no good for either of us.”

“What do you mean ‘isolation’? What’s going on? You—you can't do this! This is _wrong_!”

“Gentlemen,” the woman says, and Keith freezes when he feels the tip of a needle breach the skin of his neck. The sedative hits him hard and fast; in seconds, he’s staggering back into his captors' arms.

“Take him to Observation Room Sub-Level E,” the woman says, her voice distant and indistinct, and it’s the last thing Keith remembers before everything’s enveloped in black.

 

2.1 Observation

Despite how quickly it fled from him, Keith feels his consciousness return slowly, darkness opening up to a haze of dizziness and nausea before clearing enough for him to see. He's on his back on a bed—not his bed but a hospital bed with metal cribbing along the sides. A row of lights hangs over him, and either his vision is too messed up to see clearly or they're just turned down low because the room is dark enough that it obfuscates much of his surroundings.

_Where… am I?_

He shudders out a breath and nearly gags; something's filling his mouth, pressing down on his tongue so he can't speak. He tries to move, and his body burns with an ache that seems to stretch from his feet to the top of his head. His brain is awake enough to panic now, and he jerks upward. But he goes nowhere, and the burning pain returns twofold. He sobs aloud, hearing his own voice muffled by the obstruction in his mouth.

“Are you awake?”

The voice sends chills down his spine with recognition. The auburn-haired woman from his last memories appears before him, smiling a little. He tries to pull away and finally realizes that he's bound to the bed; leather cuffs locked around his wrists and ankles anchor him to the frame, and heavy straps stretch over his legs, chest, and neck to hold them down. While he was out, someone stripped him to just a pair of form-fitting black undershorts that aren't his. An IV line’s been stuck into his right forearm, and some kind of tube carrying a brownish liquid from a hanging bag is taped to his abdomen. It's disarming, thinking of what's been done to him while he was unconscious, wondering what  _else_  was done to him, and he whimpers, feeling so exposed, so violated, that it makes him queasy.

The woman chuckles. “Calm down, dear. You're safe.”

 _Bullshit,_  he thinks at once.

“I imagine you’re a little confused right now and maybe a tad sore. Don't worry. All will be explained in time.”

Keith growls out a string of expletives, but the thing in his mouth renders it all unintelligible.

“Yes, I understand. You have questions and concerns of your own, I'm sure. But I also have some things I must say, and so I would appreciate it if you would not interrupt me. Once I've said my piece, then I'll let you speak. Deal?”

Keith scowls. As if he has a choice.

“Excellent,” the woman says to his angry silence. “Then allow me to introduce myself. I am Dr. Dahlia Gavin. I’m the lead researcher on extraterrestrial life here at the Galaxy Garrison. I could go on about my credentials, but I think I would only succeed in boring you, so let's leave my biography alone.

“You, however—you've got quite a story that demands telling, don't you?”

She moves from his bedside to a table at the periphery of his vision and picks something up. “After a search of your room at the orphanage, we found this.”

Keith’s eyes widen as she holds her hands out to show him the knife, _his_ knife, the one Dad said Mom left him as his only memento of her.

“You recognize it,” Gavin says, setting it aside. “I thought you might. It’s an intriguing little thing, isn’t it? We ran some tests and determined that it’s not constructed of any material found on Earth.”

Keith’s heart jumps up to his throat. Not human. He’s not human. He’s long suspected the knife is of unearthly origins—he’s never been able to identify the material himself. But never has he taken that thought to its logical conclusion—that his mother was—that he is—

“To keep things brief, that’s what we want to find out. What it—and you—are made of. Where you’re from. And most importantly, if you mean us any harm.”

Keith shivers, his breaths laboring around the thing in his mouth.

“Alright,” Gavin says, placing her palm over it, “your turn.”

She lifts her hand, and that’s when Keith realizes that the obstruction isn’t a gag to keep him quiet—it’s some kind of heavy mouth guard followed by a dark, snaking tube that she draws, with horrifying sluggishness, from far down his throat. He chokes around it, terror eclipsing reason as he fights against his restraints. The moment the end of it passes over his lips, he lapses into a fit of coughing and spitting, saliva spilling down his chin and dripping like hot wax onto his bare chest.

    “Deep breaths,” Gavin says, looking, infuriatingly, like she’s holding back laughter. “It’s only an endoscope.”

“Why are you doing this?” Keith gasps once he’s certain he can speak without throwing up. “I'm not—I’m not an _alien_ ! I'm  _human_!”

“Not according to your DNA.” She slips a tablet out from the pocket of her lab coat and swipes absently over it. “In any case, we’re not here to debate that. Tell me, what’s your current level of pain? On a scale of one through ten.”

“I— _what_?”

“Answer the question and this will go all the smoother.”

“F-five?” Keith stutters out. _What_ will go smoother?

“Interesting.” Gavin taps something out on her tablet. “We have you on some pretty heavy painkillers. You shouldn’t be experiencing that level of pain.”

“Wh-what did you _do_ to me?”

“Nothing terribly invasive. We merely collected tissue samples from your heart, lungs, liver, et cetera. But the painkillers should have taken the edge off the soreness from the extraction sites by now.”

Biopsy? Extraction? How can any of that be considered noninvasive? No wonder he feels like his body’s burning up from the inside out.

“Painkillers have never really worked on me,” he admits, without thinking.

“Is that so? Fascinating. Let me make a note of that.” Gavin starts typing on her tablet, and Keith realizes too late that it was a mistake to tell her that. “I'll have to construct an appropriate trial to measure your pain response and tolerance in comparison to that of a human. And of course, I'll make a note to study the effects of various analgesics on the foreign DNA in your body, your opioid receptors—”

“No,” Keith says, aghast. “You're—you're going to torture me!”

Gavin gives him a half-smile, eerily dissonant. “Well,” she says, “this is research. But don’t worry—you won't remember much of it anyway.”

 

2.2 Enhanced Information Extraction

Gavin leaves soon after without untying him. He wasn't expecting her to, but he panics when she's in the doorway about to leave him here, bound and alone.

“F-food,” he says, grasping weakly at his restraints to remind her of them. “And I”—his face colors—“I need to use the bathroom…”

“Don’t worry about that,” she says with a shrug. “You’re on TPN—that feeding tube there.” She gestures to his stomach. “And we’ve already prepped you with a catheter and rectal tube, so go ahead and relieve yourself if you need.”

Keith’s too stupefied, and too humiliated, to formulate a response, and Gavin leaves as if she’s said nothing at all amiss.

Now that he’s alone, the confinement of the small room strikes him. The lights remain dim, and there isn't much for him to distract himself with. Besides his bed, he can make out (tauntingly) a toilet and a shower knob and dial fixed over a drain way too small to even consider escaping from. A surveillance camera flickers red in the corner by the door which has no visible means of opening from this side. He turns his attention to his restraints. They're medical-grade and don't show any give when he jerks his hands against them. He swallows, dry-mouthed.

He has to get out of here.

The pain makes it hard to focus. He wonders, as time slogs on, if it's getting worse. He stares at the IV drip. Is it just a painkiller they're pumping into him? His limbs feel heavy even though they're limp in their bonds. Shifting around what little space he's allowed doesn't help. He's sure Gavin is watching through the camera. He's sure she doesn't care—at least, not in the way a human _should_.

It gets to where the pain pushes him to the threshold of consciousness. He starts seeing things, things like the knife floating over him, like Dad staring reproachfully from his bedside. He sees Shiro, too, his face twisted in disgust, and he whimpers. He reaches out, but Shiro turns from him, and then the knife’s back, splitting into four and pinning down his wrists and ankles.

 _Come back,_ he tries to call out, but his teeth are chattering, and his jaw is too numb to form the words. Pain is a lion roaring in his ears, in his blood, and he can't even open his mouth to scream.

“We're going to measure your pain response to external stimuli now.”

Gavin’s voice cuts through the whirlwind in his head. Keith blinks.

He's sitting in a high-backed chair with his hands strapped to the armrests and his feet tied together. Pads and wires sprout from his cheeks, temples, and chin, and something stiff and metallic encircles his head. He strains to remember what he’s doing here, where “here” even is, but his head feels scrambled, and his memory cuts off every time he tries feebly to access it.

“Let’s begin with level one,” Gavin says.

He doesn't know _what_ goes through him on her word, just that it’s brisk and unpleasant and makes his muscles convulse. He moans low in his throat. The pain stops.

“Very good. Commencing level two.”

The pain returns like an electric current that targets his nerve endings with pinpoint precision. He lets out a guttural cry, scarcely recognizable as his own voice. Again, the pain ends.

“Now look at that,” Gavin says, her voice a distant echo in his ears over his thundering heartbeat. “Though you’re in pain, your pleasure centers have all lit up as well—much more than is natural.”

She crouches before him, hovering in his blurred vision. “Is this a trait of your people?” she asks. “Were you bred for war? To enjoy pain so that you don’t shy from it in combat?”

Bred? No—he's not an animal.

“Well, let’s see how much you can tolerate.”

This time when he screams, the pain doesn’t stop.

He feels euphoric, after a while. Is that his so-called pleasure center? But it doesn't feel  _good_.

He wonders, as he lets go of consciousness, if Shiro’s back is still turned toward him.

 

He's disoriented when he wakes. Is he in the hospital? His head feels like it's been split in two. Hit by a truck. Stomped all over.

“Welcome back.”

A woman's voice. The devil's voice. Gavin swims into focus before his eyes. He feels them water on their own, leak tears down onto his cheeks. No. No. Not her.

“We don’t have to go through this again.”

Again—right. This isn't the first time. She's hooked him up to that machine more times than he can remember.

How long has he been here?

“Tell me about your mother. About the knife.”

He doesn’t know about Mom or the knife. She doesn’t believe him.

“Why don’t you just tell me, Keith?”

What? What can he tell her?

“Keith, tell me.”

He can’t when there’s nothing—

“Keith.”

“Shiro,” he rasps. “Shiro…”

“Why don’t you just tell me, Keith?” Shiro asks. “Don’t you trust me?”

Why is Shiro here? Why won’t he help? “I _do_ trust you, Shiro… You’re the _only_ one I…”

“You don’t deserve my trust, Keith. You don’t deserve any of me.”

He knows that’s true; he’s known all along, so why...

“You deserve _this_ . You’re not human. You’re a _monster_.”

He _knows_ that. He knows…

So why does it hurt so much to hear him say it?

 

2.3 Phase 1 Conclusion

“We were finally able to observe an analgesic effect when we dosed him with a strong hallucinogen. He believed he was speaking with Lieutenant Shirogane.”

 _Shiro?_ Keith stirs. The dim lights of his room still burn his eyes; he squeezes them shut again.

“He’s been taken off TPN, yet his body continues to function at a higher than expected efficiency.”

Efficient? He’s so hungry he can’t move.

“Well, what are you waiting for? Hurry up and bring him! I want to do more tests before—”

Keith hears a crash, the clatter of metal instruments on the floor. Gavin groans.

“Keith!” It’s a man’s voice, so painfully familiar.

“Who the hell are you?” Gavin gasps.

“Keith, I’m going to get you out of here, just hang on—”

That voice—

“You… Are you really from the Garrison? You’re depriving us of an invaluable specimen! What I’ve been searching all my life for!”

“ _Keith_!”

He opens his eyes and doesn’t wait for them to clear before the name is on his lips; he already knows.

“Shiro,” he breathes.

 

3.1 Case Study of Subject 01-Omega Terminated

Keith doesn't remember how he leaves the facility. He doesn't remember how he ends up lying on his side on the couch in Shiro's quarters, dressed in a too-big t-shirt and baggy, Garrison-issue sweatpants. He  _does_  remember stupid, inconsequential things, like thanking Shiro for driving him and apologizing for intruding (Adam's away at a conference for the week, Shiro tells him, and he’s never intruding).

When he finally starts to come to himself, it’s when he’s over Shiro’s arm, retching onto the carpet.

“Not so fast!” Shiro warns, moving to support him with both hands.

“Sorry,” he wheezes.

Shiro helps him back onto the couch. “You _need_ medical attention.”

“No!” Keith cries, and it feels familiar, like they've already had this argument tonight. And he remembers, suddenly, that they have, when Shiro drove him here reluctantly after trying to take him to the hospital first.

“Keith,” Shiro pleads, “just let me—”

“No,” Keith repeats, grasping Shiro's wrist so hard his own fingers begin to throb. “Shiro,  _please_ ... I'm fine, I—I can't go to—I can't go to another facility. Not tonight.  _Please_.”

Shiro hesitates, and Keith can tell he's unhappy with the idea. “Just tonight,” he relents at last. “Just tonight, and in the morning—”

“I'll go without a fight. Yeah, I got it.”

“But if your condition takes a turn for the worse at any point tonight, I'm taking you in no matter what you try to do to stop me. And you're really going to need to try to get some sustenance into you. How long were you—did she—”

Shiro can't seem to finish, avoiding Keith's eyes.

“I... don't know,” Keith says. “A few days, maybe?” These last several hours, he hasn't even felt the hunger. He knows that can't be good, but it's hard to really be concerned about it when he has no appetite.

“Alright,” Shiro whispers, the slightest hint of a tremor in his voice. “Okay. Alright. Keith, I'm going to get you some apple juice, okay? We'll start on that. Then we'll move you up to broth once you can stomach it. Okay?”

Slowly, Keith nods, but when Shiro stands from his crouch to leave, he strikes out again, groping for him, finding his sleeve and clinging to it.

“Wait! Don't leave! Stay—stay here with me! At least until I—”

 _Fall asleep,_  he almost says, and restrains himself, realizing how fearful, how  _childish_  it sounds.

“Keith, I'm not going anywhere,” Shiro says, gently extricating his fingers from his shirt. “Just to the fridge. Right across from you.” He nods toward the kitchenette.

Keith relinquishes his hold, withdrawing into himself, feeling foolish and self-conscious and downright  _embarrassing_.

“I'll stay with you through the night,” Shiro says, reading him anyway. “Promise.”

Keith buries his head in his knees to hide the redness swelling in his cheeks.

When Shiro returns with the juice, Keith takes a tiny sip as instructed, swishing it in his mouth before swallowing it. Though he doesn't feel thirsty, the coolness of the liquid is a relief on his parched throat. He takes more sips at Shiro's prompting until the glass is empty.

“More?”

“That’s enough for now.” He looks away under the pretense of wiping his mouth on the back of his hand.

“Okay. But tell me if you need something—anything. And if you start to feel worse—”

“I'll tell you. I know.”

They lapse into silence. Keith distracts himself arranging throw pillows on the couch, choosing the softest one to settle his head down onto. Shiro pulls the quilt off the top of the couch and drapes it over him.

“Do you think you can sleep?” he asks after a beat.

“Dunno.”

Shiro inclines his head. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

Keith hesitates. “Stay,” he says at last, blushing again at his own shameless honesty. “Just... stay here. For now. That's it.”

“I promised I would, Keith. And I—I should’ve”—Shiro falters, choking on his words—“I should have protected you. I'm—I’m _so_ sorry. This is—it’s all my fault. I never should have told you to join the Garrison. I didn’t know, Keith—I didn’t know they would—this would—it’s beyond anything I could’ve imagined! And I—”

“Shiro,” Keith interrupts, stopping him with a hand on his shoulder. “It’s  _not_  your fault. You said it yourself—you didn't know. And I know you would never— _never_ —”

His voice cracks. Tears come, unbidden. He sniffles, hands jumping to his eyes to try to stop the flow, but it’s a vain effort.

“Keith—”

“Shiro, don’t blame yourself! This is  _my_  fault! Because I’m—not  _human_! I don’t deserve your attention—”

A pair of hands snaps over his shoulders, and Keith jolts, lowering his own. Shiro's closer than he expects, closer still when he leans forward, drawing Keith against him.

“I'm sorry. I'm  _so_  sorry. Keith, I don't care  _what_  you are. It'll  _never_  keep me from caring about you. I won't ever abandon you. Because whatever you are,  _whoever_  you are, I believe in you. I _always_ will.”

Keith lets himself lie against Shiro's chest, breathing in tandem with him, his jittery heartbeats pulsing against slow, measured ones.

“How many times—?” Keith starts, their old mantra.

“As many times as it takes.”

Keith buries his face in Shiro's shirt.

“Okay,” he sighs against him.

 

Addendum—

Keith trails a pointer finger over the ring of dark skin on his wrist. It looks like a bruise, at first. Part of it still _is_. But when he holds it up close to his eyes, he can see them: the parallel red tracks that form the shape of a shackle.

The doctor told him the scars would lighten in time, but they probably wouldn't ever go away entirely. Same for his other wrist, his ankles, everywhere the restraints bit into bare skin. It's stupid. He hardly even remembers his ordeal (Shiro's word for what happened). He wasn't in his right mind for most of it, and yet here are these scars carving memories that aren't his into his body, forever…

He shudders. Of course, there's his alien blood to take into account. Maybe that will heal him. It would be the first good thing it's done for him.

He pushes the sleeves of Shiro's sweatshirt down over his wrists and curls into his knees, hugging them to him. It's been two weeks since... all of _that_ . Two weeks, and he's barely left Shiro's couch. He's there now, in the middle of the afternoon, the news playing softly on the TV in the background—some comfort story about a rescued dog (it's sort of like him, isn't it?). Before he left for work with Adam, Shiro stocked him with a few books, a bottle of water, and some protein bars, all piled neatly on the side table. Keith hasn't touched any of it. Maybe he'll do some reading to distract himself later, but he still doesn't have much of an appetite. He's lost a lot of weight, and that worries Shiro, so he always makes a point of choking down _something_ at dinner when they all sit around the small table and eat together.

The front door is locked—Shiro assures him that it is every morning when he leaves—and so Keith starts when he hears it creak open. But it's just Shiro himself, home early for some reason, arms laden with a brown takeout bag. Keith relaxes back into his pillows.

“I'm sorry—did I startle you?” Shiro closes the door behind him, discreetly locking it.

“No,” Keith lies, and then: “Don't you have a class to teach right now?”

“It was cancelled. The higher-ups needed the room for an emergency meeting after—” Shiro stops himself short.

“It's about me, isn't it?” Keith mutters. Shiro is quiet. “Let me guess: Something else came out about me from interrogating that woman.”

Shiro sighs. Keith rolls over onto his side, facing the back of the couch. “You don't have to hide it from me, you know. I'm not dumb.”

He hears Shiro set the bag down on the table. “I don't think you're dumb. And I'm not trying to hide anything from you. Do you want to talk about it?”

Keith buries his head into the cushions. “Not really.”

He hears Shiro approach him but doesn't lift his head.

“Come on. I got us some ramen from that place you like. Let's have lunch together.”

This isn't the first time Shiro's patronized the local Japanese joint to try to nudge him to eat. It usually works. At least ramen is easy to slurp down on an uncooperative stomach.

Keith turns around, staring up at Shiro, noting, with some guilt, the concern in his crinkled brow. “Alright,” he relents.

He lets Shiro help him up by the hand. It's so childish, but he loves the contact, the feeling of security when Shiro's physically touching him like some infallible protector. It's almost like having Dad back.

They sit across from each other at the table. Keith lets Shiro pour his broth, break apart his chopsticks. The ramen _does_ smell good, so after some hesitation, he lifts some strands to his mouth.

Shiro starts in on his own ramen. “Good, right?”

“Hm.”

The silence resumes. Keith keeps his face low to his bowl because for some reason, it's too embarrassing to look at Shiro right now. That happens a lot, lately. He never used to feel so small looking up to him, but now, after his ordeal…

“They've... decided to press charges,” Shiro says at length.

Keith swallows. “They're using her as a scapegoat.”

Slowly, Shiro nods. “But it's a start—”

“No,” Keith interrupts, slamming down his chopsticks. “It's an end! It's going to all end with that woman—'she acted on her own, there's nothing more we can do'—you _know_ that's what's going to happen! And—and she deserves everything that comes to her, but you know—you _know_ she wasn't the only one involved! They're going to get away with it, and—”

His breath hitches, and tears prick his eyes. He scrubs them away with his fist. Shiro reaches across the table, touches his other hand.

“ _I_ won't let this go.”

Keith blinks back more tears. Shiro shimmers before his vision, a mirage, something too good to be true, too good for _him_.

“What does it matter now,” he moans.

“It _does_ matter. I'll find out who authorized this. I won't rest until I do. And I swear to you, I _won't_ let them get away with it.”

Keith sniffles, and Shiro's hand tightens over his. Still, he thinks, what does it matter now? Does it matter if it doesn't matter?

His head's a mess. Everything's a mess, really. He never asked for any of this. But then, his whole life's been shit, really, ever since Dad died.

At least, until he met Shiro.

“Keith. No matter what happens, you'll always have me on your side. _Always_.”

Maybe this is enough, for now.


End file.
